Joel D. Sherman, Ph.D. Secretariat of Public Education – Mexico UNESCO Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean Nassau, Bahamas 9-10 December 2008

Why Analyze Trends?  Current values on an indicator may not seem favorable, but could be an improvement over past values.  Trend measures can be used to examine the “impact” of policy changes.  When indicators move in the desired direction, research can identify contributory factors. (What works and why?)  When indicators do not improve, research can identify contributory factors and strategies to address them.

Key Issues in Analyzing and Presenting Trend Data  Selecting the period for analysis (1 year, 5 years, 10 years).  Selecting the starting and ending points for analysis.  Presenting “unadjusted” or “adjusted” data for particular indicators.  Current or constant expenditures  GDP in current or inflation-adjusted currency  Considering other factors that might affect trends.  Starting values on the indicator  Other demographic, economic or social measures

Trends in Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios – 1999 to 2005 Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios – 1999 to 2005 Country Country Argentina Germany Brazil Hungary Chile Indonesia China Ireland Czech Republic Italy Denmark Jordan Egypt X 62.5Malaysia Finland Mexico

First Steps in Organizing the Data Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios – 1999 to 2005 WEI Countries 1999 RatioChangeOECD Countries 1999 RatioChange Argentina Czech Republic Brazil Denmark Chile Finland China Germany EgyptmmHungary Indonesia Ireland Jordan Italy Malaysia Mexico WEI Mean (All) OECD Mean (All)

Making the Data More Useful Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios – 1999 to 2005 Country1999 RatioChangeCountry1999 RatioChange Jordan Hungary Argentina Denmark Indonesia OECD Mean WEI Mean Ireland Chile Finland China Germany Malaysia Italy Brazil Mexico Czech Republic

Final Steps in Organizing the Data Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios – 1999 to 2005 Countries1999 RatioChangeCountries1999 RatioChange Hungary Mexico Denmark Indonesia Jordan WEI Mean Argentina Chile OECD Mean China Ireland Malaysia Finland Brazil Germany Czech Republic Italy

Graphing Trends in Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios

Graphing Relationship 1999 Ratios and Change Between 1999 and 2005

Finding “Outliers” 1999 Upper Secondary Graduation Ratios and Change 1999 to 2005 Upper Secondary Ratios (Mean 66.1) Change 1999 to 2005 (+7.7) Below MeanAbove Mean Below MeanArgentinaBrazil Chile China Czech Republic Indonesia Malaysia Mexico Above MeanDenmark Finland Germany* Hungary Ireland Jordan *Same as Mean Change Italy

What Can We Say?: General Findings  Countries that began the period with higher upper secondary graduation ratios tended to have either smaller increases or small declines in their ratios over the 1999 to 2005 period.  Countries with relatively low upper secondary graduation ratios in 1999 which had the largest increases in their ratios over the period include the Czech Republic, Brazil, Malaysia and China. Other countries with relatively large increases are Chile, Peru, Luxembourg, Paraguay and Indonesia.  Several countries do not conform to the general pattern. The Philippines, Argentina and Thailand all had graduation ratios below the median in 1999, but also had relatively small increases in their ratios over the period. Italy, Germany and Finland, in contrast, started out with relatively high graduation ratios, but also had above-median increases in their ratios between 1999 and 2005.

Country Focus: Argentina  Argentina began the period with a relatively low upper secondary graduation ratio (40.0). In contrast with most other countries with available data, Argentina’s ratio showed only a small increase between 1999 and 2005.

Country Focus: Malaysia  Malaysia began the period with an upper secondary graduation ratio (62.0) just below the median, among countries with available data. However, between 1999 and 2005, Malaysia’s ratio increased by 24.6 points, bring the country’s ranking to 7 th in 2005.

Country Focus: Thailand  Thailand began the period with an upper secondary graduation ratio (65.0) just below the median, among countries with available data. However, between 1999 and 2005, Thailand’s ratio increased by only 0.4 points, leaving Thailand much lower in the rankings in 2005 than in 1999.